Parsifal 21

Parzifal - the medieval hero of tales and songs and his counterpart, “Parsifal 21”, the modern loser of the 21st century, the antithesis of the great and docile hero. The original Parzifal is a strong knight of Artus' Round Table, a hero in his world, fighting with strength and honor. During his journey he gets more and more involved in Christian ideology and ends up faithful, strong and integrated in the highest society of his time. Worth reading, if you like medieval literature as “Erec” or “Iwain”.

Standing in tradition of this great opus and all its following works concerning this topic, Cryogenic set a counterpoint with their concept of the modern man failing in his ideas and abilities, falling from faith and believe. And, believe me, they do not fail, far from it! The challenge Cryogenic got themselves into does not seem to be any problem for those guys.

Starting with the artwork, which is, from the outside, completely kept in white, including the cd and the alteration of the booklet. But if you open it, you will be drawn into darkness: Dark colours, a cold and distraught design and photos, that are lovely arranged and seem to represent the personality of every band member for its own. A lot of work has been invested in designing the booklet for sure and I consider it very felicitous. As much as the lyrics the whole artwork creates a permanent impression of a high degree of mastery and art. Also, there is a great relationship between music and artwork, as much as I never found anything this strong again. Beneath the perfect, white surface pulses a foul black greasy mass and is about to burst out.

The music is incredibly beautiful; for sure, I cannot imagine anything to complain about. Imagine a rag made of silk, skillfully woven to warm you and not to make you sweat; imagine beautiful and subtle drawings on it that create a structure which only could have been crafted by a masters hand. That is what the music is like.

Skillfully played guitars utter filigree riffs, but also can unleash a storm of howling anguish, perfectly fitted to the particular situation of the song – or the silk in my metaphor. Cryogenic’s ideas in working with the guitars are completely original and have never been created that way. Electronic ones alternate with acoustics, just as the wanted effect requires it and the hell, it always works.

Deeply woven into this, imaginable as the mentioned drawings, are the keys and synths. They work as the orchestra of the music, as a counterpart to the often sad sounding guitars in creating a longing and pestering mood. The mastery in which they are involved and played at the same time always leaves me speechless and deeply impressed. One could make a lot of mistakes trying to integrate keys in a rather aggressive style of music, but Cryogenic captivate their listeners by always stirking the right note at the right time. The music would not be bad without the keys and synths, far from it, but it would be somehow naked without the wafting cloak of sounds, touching melodies and perfectly placed effects of the electronic helpers. This album contains so many tiers, even I, owning it for about four years right now, can always find something in it that I haven’t noticed before. This is in a big part the credit of the keys and synths.

Imagine drums, whirling, crackling, running, but somehow petting, grooming and warming the listener in their great variation without going over the top of progressiveness, which would not fit anymore. Still, this is black metal. A slight problem here is to be found: The production, which is clear and defined, varies a bit in the audibility of the drums, they are sometimes a bit too much mixed in the background, which still is better than having them overrhythmizing the whole songs by smashing everything down with their presence. Everything else can be heard perfectly, the guitars, the keys, the small yet melodic bass lines and the vocals.

Vocals. A big problem in black metal as in any kind of music: If the vocalist did a shitty job or is just mediocre, the whole musical concept would be in danger of devalutaion. To say it straight forward, Cryogenic’s vocalist is a great one, not a genius, but in the upper ranks. He is able to scream in a distant, lonely and despaired way, can sing clearly without missing the tones and has the rare ability of creating atmosphere with spoken word. Intelligent lyrics are fitted perfectly into the whole concept by having the vocalist combining all his abilities and waiting till the right moment. And even the songs/interludes in which he is quiet are atmospheric, touching and sparkling with musical creativity. It might be that the song “Synthese” is the best on the whole album, if one could say that.

“Parsifal 21” does not try to be evil, satanic or insane, it describes the inner struggle with incertitude and overwhelmingly incontrollable strength. No clichés are pulled up, contrariwise a new way is defined: Cryogenic do not even try to create something as known black metal in here, their music adds more than one new aspect to the stagnating scene (which I also do like, to say it clearly, I am not one of those who decline the tradition and its followers), but not in a constrained and constructed way as some other german “top-bands” do.

One of my all-time favourites.